Category Archives: Perspective

Awakening Attitude

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Jack-Jack.

Recently, I saw an excellent article by John Welwood in Tricycle magazine called The Psychology of Awakening. Too often, awakening and psychological health are seen as different worlds even though they’re closely entwined. “…even among advanced spiritual practitioners, certain islands — unexamined complexes of personal and cultural conditioning, blind spots, or areas of self-deception — may often remain intact within the pure stream of their realization.” This is very true. They can remain unseen until events trigger them. Yet even then, if we see ourselves as separate from our humanity, we may excuse our bad behaviour or blame others. I’ve … Continue Reading… →

Ways of Seeing, Modes of Living

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stairs

The world around us can be perceived through several distinct lenses. Our past experiences certainly are a major influence, not to mention our dominant sense, our culture (group consciousness), our stage of development, and so forth. Through an appropriate spiritual practice that brings transcendence (Samadhi, Turiya), we not only touch into consciousness (presence) but we refine the physiology and our senses of perception. Refinement takes place through purification of the subtle layers of our physiology and a shift in the overall tone or dominant guna we carry. This combination refines our perceptual abilities. Each of us comes into this life … Continue Reading… →

Truth

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glacier national park

I can define truth as facts yet facts are items of information or data. How we see that data depends on the perceiver. Similarly, truth can be defined as a proposition or idea that is accepted as true. We might call this shared truth. But again, this is relative to the perceivers. We once considered it true that the world was flat and that the sun revolved around us. In a deeper sense, and the way I use the word here, truth is a “transcendent fundamental or spiritual reality.” But even there, what we recognize as truth is relative to … Continue Reading… →

The Home of Knowledge

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St. Francis of Xavier Cathedral

A lot of what we call knowledge today is information. Information can be very useful data but it describes details rather than reality itself. True knowledge is embedded in the layers of reality, be it the subtle structures that underlay all forms and phenomena, the field of becoming that accepts only truth (ritam and resolute intellect), the dynamics of consciousness, or the intelligence of Divinity. In many spiritual circles, there is an emphasis on alertness, on the quality of consciousness that makes us aware. This is the Purusha value, the witness. This wakes up to itself as consciousness so there … Continue Reading… →

Perspectives of the World

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reflection

As we grow spiritually, there are several processes underway. One is the removal of veils on consciousness. This is the process of purification of the means of experiencing. In Sanskrit this masking is known as Chhandas, covering. Curving back on itself repeatedly, consciousness can become so concentrated, it becomes dense and gains a surface appearance. We may then confuse this appearance with reality, especially if we become identified with it. Yet once we directly experience what is behind our experiences, we start to see through the veils. Often the shadows originate in some misunderstanding about the world. This causes us … Continue Reading… →

The Unbalanced Masculine

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dead tree

I often write articles about personal inner work but current events are bringing large shadows to the surface. It’s important to talk about so we have a reasonable perspective on the issues being highlighted.   For a long time, the masculine has been dominant in global cultures. This takes the form of a dominant 3rd chakra. This has led to an emphasis on power, the mind, and in the West, individuality – the personal self. Culturally, we’re like pre-teens focused on me. This is an evolutionary step up from survival and tribal cultures. But if it becomes entrenched, it becomes … Continue Reading… →

Nature Begins

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Droplet

I’ve written before about the 7 koshas or sheathes. Each of these are progressively smaller and denser layers. They arise from the dynamics of consciousness and end up as ourselves and the apparent material world. Apparent because it has no reality in itself. It is the surface appearance of much deeper dynamics. Another perspective is that of Nature. We can see Nature as the “forces and processes that produce and control all the phenomena” of the world. We might see Nature as the sum of all the laws of nature. But it’s more true to see Nature as that which … Continue Reading… →

Balance allows Transformation

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metal disc

Life founds spiritual evolution on the cycle of growth: balance, dissolution, growth, integration, and return to balance. You can also see these as maintenance, destruction, creation, and a return to maintenance. Transformation and reintegration are founded on the starting point. Growth builds on the prior balance. Life moves in steps like this so the refined aspects of our being can be sustained. We’re able to integrate the changes progressively, even if they feel like a stretch sometimes. Dust may obscure things temporarily but the fine feelings remain intact. Our various aspects can be at different points on the growth cycle. … Continue Reading… →

Inherent Intelligence

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sugar magnolia

When we talk about origins, it’s important to recognize the intelligence embedded in the process of all experience and expression. Pure Divinity seeps into everything. For example, in the origins of consciousness, when liveliness stirs alertness, it doesn’t just agitate it. Alertness becomes awareness which becomes self-referencing and reflective. This is the foundation of all experience. Similarly, within the dynamics of consciousness, there would be no devata value or process of experience and no recognition if there were not inherent intelligence. On a more personal level, we can see the dynamics of our own intelligence. When we’re agitated, our forebrain … Continue Reading… →

Types of Spaces

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I’ve written before about nested space. Every object we experience arises near instantly and in every moment in layers. We’re all familiar with how everything is made of subatomic particles, atoms, and molecules, but this is a scale. Everything also has layers of expression, from an impulse in consciousness though vibration, structure, field, and into form. The level of vibration happens within space. Each object arises in a space from a vibration which then gains structure, fields, and form as it expresses forward through the layers. Some objects express all the way into “earth”, the physical. Other things don’t express … Continue Reading… →

Smooth Loops

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Traprain Law

On a grand scale, life moves in vast contractive and expansive cycles. We can say the Divine flows down from greater than infinity into a point of life and experiencing we know as the soul, ourselves. Every point then expands out into expression and infinite thoughts, emotions, forms, and experiences. Simultaneously, that infinity of outward expression turns back in on itself, collapsing back to a point of knowing which collapses back into infinite wholeness and the source from which the process begins. These are the vast flows of life out into expression and back to source.   However, when some aspect … Continue Reading… →

On Animals

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In a recent discussion, animals came up and I thought it worth touching on a few points. DNA tells us that animals are built of the same stuff as we are. We also share a lot of the same DNA blueprint. Similarly, animals have souls, chakras, feel pain & emotions, have thoughts, and have many of the features we attribute to humans. Yet most animals live in the flow of life. Humans are distinct because we have the gift of perception of free will plus the higher intellect. This gives us the opportunity to understand and change the world but … Continue Reading… →